August 24, 2000 - Breaking a Long Line | WebReference

August 24, 2000 - Breaking a Long Line

Yehuda Shiran August 24, 2000
Breaking a Long Line
Tips: August 2000

Yehuda Shiran, Ph.D.
Doc JavaScript

It is sometimes very annoying to have to scroll horizontally when the text line is longer than the window's width. Starting from Internet Explorer 5.5, you can control the layout of a text in a container. The style's property you use is whiteSpace:

object.style.whiteSpace = sWordWrapMode;

where sWordWrapMode is one of two options:

The following paragraph (works only in IE 5.5 and up) demonstrates the whiteSpace property. The user can click one of the two links following the paragraph, making it a multi-line (wordwarpped) or a single line (scrolling is needed) paragraph. Play around with the paragraph word wrapping behavior:

Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line

One Line Multi-Line Here is how we defined the above paragraph and links:

<P ID="longWord" STYLE="word-wrap:break-word; width:100%; left:0">
Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line Long Line
</P>
<A HREF="javascript:void(longWord.style.whiteSpace='normal')">One Line</A>
<A HREF="javascript:void(longWord.style.whiteSpace='nowrap')">Multi-Line</A>

The whiteSpace property applies only to elements that have layout. An element has layout when it is absolutely positioned, is a block element, or is an inline element with a specified height or width. Notice the width specification above to make it an element with layout. The links themselves are straight-forward. You just change the whiteSpace property to the desired value. Notice the usage of void() above. It is necessary to avoid overwriting of the page with the return value from the javascript: call, which is the property assignment value (normal or nowrap).